Anthropic's amended IPO filing shows compute costs at 58% of revenue

Anthropic filed the amendment on Monday, extending financial disclosures from 30 June to 30 September, TechCrunch reported. Revenue reached $17 billion in the quarter, up from $11.5 billion in the previous quarter. The operating loss grew at the same time, driven in large part by growing compute costs.

Compute costs rise

The filing showed compute took 58% of revenue in the quarter, up from 48% the quarter before. The compute bill rose to $10 billion, including $5.0 billion of compute under short-term commitments, which the filing said "currently costs significantly more than comparable compute procured under our multi-year commitments."

A chart in the filing tracks revenue per dollar spent on compute. It grew steadily from the start of 2025 and, in the latest quarter, reached just over 2x before falling back to 1.72x.

The filing said compute and infrastructure expenses will increase in absolute dollars and remain the largest operating expense for the foreseeable future as more committed capacity arrives under multi-year arrangements.

Commitments behind the filing

Anthropic's amended registration statement discloses at least $582 billion in non-cancelable spending commitments to five companies: Amazon, AMD, Broadcom, Google and Microsoft. Total contractual commitments reach $895 billion, most stretching into the 2030s, according to an analysis by Matt Scherer published by TechPolicy.press. Anthropic holds $96 billion in cash.

Scherer wrote that it is not clear how much of the remaining $300 billion or so of the $895 billion will ultimately land on Anthropic's balance sheet. With the company still negotiating further infrastructure and compute contracts, he wrote, Anthropic may end the year with a trillion dollars or more in commitments.

Investor risk

In the TechPolicy.press opinion piece, Scherer argued the SEC should block the IPO. He wrote that the obligations are effectively debts because they are payments Anthropic is contractually required to make in the future, whether or not it can afford them.

Scherer also questioned demand, citing studies that suggest large language models are not accelerating productivity or generating positive returns for most businesses. He wrote that one study found the share of Americans using AI at work fell from 46% in summer 2025 to 33% in summer 2026.

Margins and compute deals

Anthropic reported a gross profit margin of 85.4% in the first half of 2026, compared with 26.4% for Z.ai and 17.9% for MiniMax, SCMP reported, citing Anthropic's S-1 and the two Hong Kong-listed companies' latest financial disclosures. That margin covers the first half; the 58% compute share is for the third quarter.

TechCrunch reported that Anthropic has been paying SpaceX $1.25 billion a month for compute, alongside multibillion-dollar deals with Nscale, Akamai and Volta. Those are neoclouds, smaller providers that offer more flexible deals at higher rates than hyperscalers. The report said the worsening compute margins may prove a blip rather than a long-term problem, as long as revenue keeps growing at nearly 50% a quarter. It noted that Anthropic is trying to lower costs by building its own compute base under a project called Anthropic Direct, though demand is growing too fast for that effort to keep pace.

What happens next

Anthropic still plans a November stock market debut. Scherer wrote that the company's 2026 financial results have not been subjected to formal auditing.

If the negotiations now under way close, commitments could pass a trillion dollars by the end of the year, he wrote. TechCrunch wrote that the company's future will remain at the mercy of compute prices.